Jimmy Kimmel Live has reportedly hired Heidi the Cross-Eyed Opossum* to predict this year’s Oscar winners, leading to this delightful BBC Article:

A cross-eyed, overweight opossum has won an unlikely starring role in coverage of this year’s Oscars.

Okay, I like where this is going, tell me more…

Heidi is an opossum who became a German media sensation and now has a global following, with 300,000 Facebook fans. Details of her contract are confidential but it seems she will be predicting the award winners. Producers of the show may be hoping she can emulate the success of another German celebrity creature, Paul the Octopus.

I knew Paul the Octopus. I worked with Paul the Octopus. You, madame, are no Paul the Octopus. Still, it’s undeniable that furry animals with disabilities are both hilarious and heartwarming (see also: the fainting kitties, Charley the Retarded Cat). Sometimes I think if scientists could just teach special needs kids to grow fur, it’d be much easier to find special ed teachers.

He won global fame during last year’s football World Cup, correctly predicting the outcome of all seven German games plus the Spain-Netherlands final.

Somehow I doubt a fat opossum that can’t see will be a worthy replacement for an able-bodied cephalopod that was clearly a warlock. But if it’s between a disabled marsupial and the people who nominated The Blind Side last year, I’ll take the marsupial. Maybe Heidi can even be the first to point out that The King’s Speech was boring and predictable. Opossums are notoriously unswayed by fancy acting.

For the record: Hyrax riding a tortoise > fat, cross-eyed opossum

*Quick science note here: it seems “possum” refers to marsupials native to Australia, New Guinea, and Suluwesi, while “opossum” refers to Western Hemisphere marsupials. Since Opossum sounds kind of stupid to say, I guess we have to accept that in certain cases, we’re actually saying ‘possum, not possum. Now, if someone could just add the Godd*mn G that belongs on the end of “orangutan”, we’d be set.

Join The Discussion

Kimmel wanted to hire the Family Guy manatees due to their experience in selection but decided not to when he saw their work for the AVN. Really? No Lifetime Achievement of an Erection award for Lex Steele?

How do those crossed eyes perceive 3-D cinema? Without the answer to that question, I just can’t trust her picks.

02.15.11 at 6:27 pm

Homo Erectus

Cosseyed Possum: “The only guy I see eye-to-eye with for best actor is Forrest Whitaker.”

Yeh, I know, Spaz already made an FW joke. I just couldn’t come up with another cross-eyed oscar winner. Unless Peter Falk won.

02.15.11 at 6:29 pm

Moose

Possums love garbage and dog food, so they’ll love The Kids Are All Right.

02.15.11 at 6:35 pm

spazmodic

FW? More now!

02.15.11 at 6:36 pm

Lance Manning

Hey say what you want about Forest Whitaker but at one time he had his tongue across Robin Given’s backside.

(Long Awkward Silence)

SHUT UP!

02.15.11 at 6:37 pm

Lance Manning

Fun Fact: Roman Polansky wanted to direct The Kids Are Alright.

02.15.11 at 7:38 pm

Hyrax

Every damn time I see that hyrax on a tortoise, I literally ejaculate a cross-eyed opossum. – Pete Hammond

02.15.11 at 7:52 pm

Farthammer

Hate to be a downer, but those fainting cats weren’t funny. They lived a tortured life and died not too long after that video.

Ummm…tits?

02.15.11 at 8:51 pm

Dingus

Newsflash: When told that Hollywood would be relying on paganic animal divination this year to predict Oscar™ winners, Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, responded,
“It’s nice to see they’re finally ditching that Scientology™ crap”.

He was then lifted upon the shoulders of his adoring subjects and triumphantly paraded through the streets of Tehran to wild celebrations of modest piety.

02.15.11 at 10:55 pm

bloodfart

Those cats were killed…with kindness? Just kidding, someone probably just set those phasers from stun to, well, you know.

(READ: they were set to kill)

02.16.11 at 9:30 am

Asher

I can’t believe you gullible assholes are falling for ANOTHER performance art piece. GET FRANCO’D, MOTHERFUCKER!